


Dachshund Through The Snow

by FictionPenned



Category: Schitt's Creek
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-11
Updated: 2020-11-11
Packaged: 2021-03-08 19:00:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,045
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27031573
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FictionPenned/pseuds/FictionPenned
Summary: “Everyone knows you can stack Draw 2 cards on other Draw 2 cards, David,” Alexis insists, repeatedly trying to shove a bright yellow card on top of the discard pile as David thwarts her attempts with an intervening hand.“No, Alexis, the official UNO Twitter account definitely tweeted that you can’t,” David snaps back. He is both tightly wound and at the end of his rope, and though most people would generously attribute the condition to the tense circumstances of a strange dog and a snowstorm, Alexis is very aware that uptightness is simply an immutable fact of being David. Can’t live with him, can’t live without him.“If it’s not on the box, then it doesn’t count.”“We don’t know what’s on the box, because your dog took a bite out of it.”Alexis looks after a puppy during a snowstorm. Written for Fic In A Box 2020.
Relationships: Alexis Rose & David Rose
Comments: 3
Kudos: 14
Collections: Fic In A Box





	Dachshund Through The Snow

**Author's Note:**

  * For [sandyk](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sandyk/gifts).



The dachshund puppy wriggles in her arms, desperate to get loose, and Alexis tightens her embrace to keep it close. She cannot lose this dog, especially not this close to the motel, otherwise both her job and Ted’s good will are on the line. Alexis already stretches the boundaries of allowable unprofessionalism at her job — both consciously and unconsciously — and she _literally_ cannot afford to get fired. It’s a new sensation, being afraid of losing a job. She still isn’t used to being a person who _works_ , and she hasn’t brushed shoulders with a celebrity or been held hostage in an East Asian country in _ages_. She’s probably not even worth being held hostage anymore. It’s not like her family’s sitting on money or anything. _Everyone_ knows the Roses are poor now. It was all over the papers, in multiple languages. She still suffers a shiver of embarrassment whenever she thinks about it.

Thanks to a lock that’s been busted for about a week now,Alexis doesn’t have to sacrifice her hold on the dog in order to dig out her keys, and she opens the front door with a shove from her stilettoed foot. She leans her head forward, making sure that David’s not around, before depositing the puppy on David’s bed — it’s the closest bed to the door, after all — and closing the door behind them.

Through the gap in the musty curtains, she can see the clouds beginning to roll in, blanketing the sky in a grey more intense and oppressive than the smoke in Leonardo DiCaprio’s rumpus room. The cold already broke a pipe in the veterinary office, hence the puppy, and conditions are threatening to get worse before they get better. She heard through the grapevine that the forecast is calling for snow, but she didn’t check it herself. Checking the weather would just make her sad. She remembers the good old days when she used to be able to hop an overnight flight and wake up in the location with the best weather. To the old Alexis, snow was only good for cozying up with cute guys at ski lodges. The new Alexis, however, has to look after this dog that isn’t even hers.

Thankfully, Ted took all the actually sick animals to his own home after the pipe broke and the place flooded, but Alexis was left with the one creature being boarded overnight in the kennel while its owner was away. Ted said it would be easy to care for, and Alexis doesn’t doubt that with a bit of confidence, she can handle it, however, she _is_ a bit worried about David’s reaction. Alexis’s guru once observed that David was resistant to change, and she can’t say that she _disagrees_.

Maybe their new tenant will help David loosen up a little.

“What’s that _thing_ , and why is it on my bed, Alexis?” David asks as soon as he walks into the room, pausing in the open doorway. Falling snow slips through the gaps, and an icy chill sweeps through the room.

“ _Ew_ , David, close the door. You’re going to throw off the energy of the room again!” Alexis calls from inside the bathroom, not bothering to crane her neck and look over at him. She is in the middle of her new 17-step skincare routine, and if she loses concentration, she’ll miss a round of moisturizer and have to start over, and she’s already gone through the first step at least three times this evening.

“First of all, you can’t just ignore the question, and second of all, this motel was created out of a ball of bad energy.” David’s response is less than understanding, but Alexis does hear the click of the door as it closes. “Why is there a —” he pauses, fishing for the right word— “A _creature_ on my bed, and why is it looking at me like that?”

“His name is Spencer, and he probably wants you to pet him. He likes little ear scritches. Scritch, scritch, David.” Alexis pauses to squeeze the right amount of cream for Step 16 onto the tips of her fingers, biting the inside of her cheek as she concentrates.

“Didn’t you have a boyfriend named Spencer?” David does _not_ sound like someone who is scritching the incredibly soft ears of a puppy. Instead, he sounds like someone cowering in the corner.

Alexis rolls her eyes and begins to massage the cream into her t-zone. “I didn’t name him, silly.”

“Then why is it _here_?” His gestures are practically audible.

“Because there was an emergency at the vet, and he needed to go _somewhere_ ,” Alexis says, as though it is the most obvious explanation in the world. She forgets to mention exactly what the emergency was, or how long the puppy might be staying with them. “Ted took everyone else, and I took Spencer. He’s little. You’ll barely notice him.”

As if on cue, Spencer barks. It’s a much louder sound than someone would expect from an animal that small.

Alexis hears David flatten himself against the wall. “You didn’t think to text me first?”

“You would’ve said no, David, and the poor thing would’ve been _almost_ homeless.”

“ _I’m_ about to be almost homeless. You couldn’t have found someone else to look after it?”

“It’s snowing, David,” Alexis pouts, poking her head out from behind the doorframe for the first time since her brother got home — sad, tear-filled eyes on full display. She’s always been good at looking just sad enough that people eventually give in and offer her whatever she wants, but David’s a harder nut to crack than most. He has practically grown immune to her many, _many_ charms by now. “You can’t just ask people to drive out and pick up a dog that’s not theirs in the _snow_.”

David raises a hand in protestation, scrunching his nose and tilting his head sideways in a manner that suggests that he will not budge until she agrees that he’s right and sends the dog off to some unknown stranger. “Actually, I’m pretty sure you can.”

“Um, no offense, David, but some of us aren’t _rude_.”

“You know what,” David sighs in exasperation, throwing his hands in the air, “ _Fine_. But the first time he wakes me up in the middle of the night, he’s sleeping in mom and dad’s room.”

“David! You know mom would _never_ let him near her wigs. And besides, Spencer would never dream of waking you up in the middle of the night; would you, _Spencer_?” Alexis slips into the cooing voice that people often use with babies, and the puppy wags his tail in reply. “See?” She raises her eyebrows as she turns her attention back to David. “He’ll be perfect. I swear.”

The promise is short-lived.

In the dead of night, after the snow has begun to gather in knee-deep dunes, swept against walls and doors and windows by the wind, a shrill whine splits the air. At first, Alexis is completely unable to place the sound. She isn’t a morning person, but she isn’t exactly a waking up in the middle of the night and operating at full capacity person either. She turns onto her stomach, buries her head and ears beneath the pillow, and groans, “David, stop sleep-crying.”

When he responds, David sounds much more awake than Alexis, and infinitely more peeved. Irritation lifts the ends of his words, spinning them into sarcastic disdain, a man on the end of his leash, stuck in perpetual purgatory. “Alexis, it’s _your_ dog.”

Alexis sits up, hair wild and eyes barely open. “A dog…?” she begins to question, but a bleary memory cuts it short. There was a flood in the veterinary clinic. And a dog in need of temporary lodging. And a poorly considered promise that the puppy would be on its absolute _best_ behavior. She forgot that dogs can’t really recognize when they need to gather up their emotions and really commit to keeping promises. “Oh. Spencer,” she finally says, wrapping her voice around the words with genuine, unfeigned surprise.

In response to his name, the small dog bounds over to the side of Alexis’s bed and braces his legs against the mattress. He’s too little to jump up on it, but that doesn’t stop him from trying.

Alexis looks down at the puppy with a wrinkled nose and an unanswered question scribbled across her furrowed brow. “What time is it?”

“It’s 2am!” David says with a readiness that suggests that he has been doing absolutely nothing for the past several minutes other than waiting for her to ask.

Alexis looks at her brother’s form, curled angrily beneath his bedsheets, and the dog. “What do you think it wants?”

“I don’t know, maybe he wants to watch some pay-per-view.” Sarcasm drips from the words like poisoned honey.

“ _David_ , that’s not helpful.”

“Alexis, he’s a dog. He probably needs to go outside and do his business.” There’s a pause, and then David adds, “Don’t you work at a vet’s office? You’ve _met_ a dog before, right?”

Alexis sniffs. She doesn’t appreciate being mocked. She earned the job on her own merit, did the interview and everything. If she didn’t deserve the job, surely Ted wouldn’t have hired her. “Of course I’ve met a _dog_ before, David. I just don’t normally meet dogs at 2am unless they belong to Vanessa Hudgens, and her dogs are _angels_.”

“Alexis,” David says, drawing out the name until it occupies almost five entire beats. “Put on your coat, put on your boots, and take the dog outside already.”

Alexis considers the ice and the snow and the freezing temperatures and asks, “Do you think Spencer needs little booties? I don’t want his toes to get cold.”

“Alexis, unless somebody handed you a set of custom-made designer dog boots on your way out the door today, the dog'll be fine. Please just take it out before it goes on the carpet.”

With a great huff of exasperation, Alexis drags herself out of the warm and cozy comfort of her bed. On her way to the door, she casts David a dagger-sharp glare that suggests that he ought to thank her for the efforts that she is going to in order to preserve the peace, and after she clicks the leash onto the dog’s collar, she and Spencer walk out into the snow.

The next morning, there is nowhere to go and no way to get there.

The snow has all but stranded the Rose family (and temporary Rose family member Spencer) in the motel. The heat isn’t up to par for this kind of storm, so they’re all bundled in warm coats and fuzzy hats and bulky gloves to keep the cold out and the heat in. For her part, Moira had managed to rig together a passable dog sweater out of a particularly ugly scarf, and though Alexis finds him significantly less adorable when swathed in pea green and rusty orange, Spencer wags his tail happily from beneath the haphazard pile.

David and Alexis pass the time by playing with a ragged set of UNO cards that Stevie found in a drawer in the lobby, a game made difficult and contrarian by the fact that the siblings cannot seem to agree on a single set of rules.

“Everyone knows you can stack Draw 2 cards on other Draw 2 cards, David,” Alexis insists, repeatedly trying to shove a bright yellow card on top of the discard pile as David thwarts her attempts with an intervening hand.

“No, Alexis, the official UNO Twitter account definitely tweeted that you _can’t_ ,” David snaps back. He is both tightly wound and at the end of his rope, and though most people would generously attribute the condition to the tense circumstances of a strange dog and a snowstorm, Alexis is very aware that uptightness is simply an immutable fact of being David. Can’t live with him, can’t live without him.

“If it’s not on the box, then it doesn’t count.”

“We don’t _know_ what’s on the box, because _your_ _dog_ took a bite out of it.”

“Children, please,” Moira interrupts from her melodramatically draped position on the couch. “Flip a coin and figure this out before the rest of us shrivel into late-stage octogenarians.”

“I think it’s a little late for that,” David mumbles under his breath, barely loud enough for his mother to hear as he fends off Alexis’s card yet again.

“ _David!_ ”

Moira Rose’s indignance goes ignored by both of her children.

“Tell you what, David, I’ll let you have your dumb Twitter rule if you draw sixteen cards right now,” Alexis proposes, flipping her hair over her shoulder and eyeing him with the superior air of someone who knows that this entire exchange is just a preamble to their own victory.

“Let me think,” her brother purses his lips in feigned thought, and the vein in his forehead pulses. “How about _no_.”

“Aw, _David_.” Alexis pouts, putting her cards down and picking up the dog, holding him in her arms and stroking down his back in much the same way a supervillain would pet a cat. “Look at Spencer. He’s so disappointed in you. See his little face?”

In truth, Spencer looks much the same way he always does, minus the horrid scarf-sweater situation.

“Tell you what, Alexis.” A sigh trickles out of David’s nostrils, interrupting the thought. “Let the dog pick which rule he wants to follow. Put him in the center of the table, and if he comes to you, you can stack your stupid +2’s or whatever, and if he comes to me, we follow the Twitter rules.”

Alexis lifts her chin, eyeing him through slightly narrowed eyes as she weighs her chances at emerging victorious. David has had nothing to do with the dog, whereas she’s been the one petting him and feeding him and taking him out in the snow. Surely he’ll come to her if she asks. “You know what? Fine. You _wish_ he’d choose you. It’s not like I’m your only friend or anything. You haven’t even been nice to him.”

Dark eyebrows rise. “Maybe that makes me aloof and mysterious in a way that you’ll never be to him, Alexis. People always want what they can’t have.”

With a huff of thinly veiled frustration, Alexis deposits the dachshund onto the center of the table. He looks at her blankly, wagging his tail expectantly as if waiting to be asked to sit or speak and lay down in exchange for a treat. 

At the exact same time, both brother and sister begin to beckon the dog towards them. “Come, Spencer,” grapples with “Here doggy,” which rises above “Who’s your favorite fake mom?” which is completely drowned out by a steady and persistent _pstpstpstpst_.

For his part, the dog remains unmoved, wagging his tail with no idea what the cacophony once means.

David gives up first, with a world-weary groan, throwing his arms up in frustrated capitulation.

Alexis hangs on a bit longer, but once it is entirely clear that the dog is either purposefully being uncooperative or too stupid to know what’s being asked of it, she, too, gives up.

Spencer does, however, resolve the game by curling up on top of both the draw pile and the discard pile, making the entire thing unplayable.

“I’m going to take a walk,” David declares, tossing his cards dismissively onto the table and striding out of the room.

Once he’s gone, Alexis leans in towards the dog and whispers. “I think we can count that as a win for me, right?”

As one might expect from a dachshund puppy, Spencer neither understands nor replies.

Perhaps because the puppy prevented Alexis from reigning victorious in the soul-shattering game that is UNO, or perhaps because the snow has made it impossible for David to participate in his usual day-to-day activities, but Alexis notices David slowly start to warm up to Spencer. She sees David slip him a bit of carrot beneath the table at dinner (healthy snacks, yay!)and though she doesn’t comment directly on the situation, she does look down at her plate and smile to herself. It’s good to see the boys bonding, even if Spencer is only staying with them for a couple more days, just until the snow melts and the damage from the broken pipe in Ted’s office can be rectified enough for the place to be hospitable.

Alexis has never considered adopting a dog before — responsibility has never been her strongest suit — but she has found that she likes the routine of caring for something else. She likes his little nose and his wagging tail and the way he snuggles at her feet when she lies down. She also likes seeing David look just a little bit happy.

Just a little bit, though.

She can’t let him _always_ be happy, otherwise she’d be out of her job as a little sister.

The next day, things go even better.

Spencer sleeps through the night, and David — _David!_ — invites the dog onto his lap while he fusses over a bit of paperwork that he’s deemed as ‘purposefully confusing and utterly ridiculous,’ and Alexis catches him petting the dog on more than one occasion. This time, she can’t help but make a comment.

“Looks like you two boys are getting on well,” she says slyly, leaning against the doorframe with coffee mug in hand.

Her brother bristles, going immediately defensive. “I have literally never wanted to hear you speak less than I do in this very moment,” he snaps, though his hand does not stop ruffling the dog’s ears.

Alexis merely winks, offering up a wry grin. “Whatever you say.” Her words dance up and down the tone scale, falling easily into the mocking rapport they so often have.

Huffing and obviously unable to come up with something suitably clever, David falls back upon his usual dismissal. “Eat glass.”

“You first.”

The smile lingers as she exits the room, and Spencer wags his tiny little tail in obvious approval.

When the snow finally starts to melt, Alexis steps out of the bathroom freshly showered, her wet hair wrapped in a towel. Her eyes sweep the room, looking for the puppy in the usual places. When she doesn’t see him, a flutter of panic beats in her chest — as fast and earnest as a drum. She overlooks the obvious clues to his safe whereabouts — David’s absence, the locked motel door, the note on the table. What can se say? She’s not a detective, and despite her track record of surviving high profile kidnappings, she is absolutely horrible at keeping a level head in a perceived crisis.

What Alexis _should_ have done is poked her head out the motel room to see the dog safely on a held leash, right outside their door, or texted David to check if he took the dog out for a quick restroom break, which he obviously did.

What she does instead is crumble beneath the sudden onset of sheer panic.

“Spencer!” she calls, pulling the towel off of her head and looking under the bed. Wet hair coils on her shoulders and clings to her forehead. “Here, boy! Where are you, bud?”

There is no sign of the dog in the room, no loving whine or thumping tail or clicking claws on the floor. For a moment, Alexis fears that she’s messed everything up, that she’ll never be trusted with a pet again, that Spencer’s somehow managed to break out, lock the motel door behind him, and go on the lam.

What will Ted say? What will Mrs. Price, Spencer’s loving owner, say?

_What will David say?_

She straightens, fingers finding her mouth as she begins to nervously gnaw on her nails. It’s a bad habit — outrageously unattractive, as her mother often says — but Alexis doesn’t care right now. It’s been all of thirty seconds, and she has already convinced herself that this is the end of the world, and it’s all her fault.

This must be what David feels like all the time.

The door opens, and David walks through it, leash in hand, accompanied by a small, snow-dusted dog.

“Spencer!” Alexis calls out, relief flooding through her and washing away the remnants of her fear. “I was so worried!”

She drops to the ground, wrapping her arms around the puppy, who wags his tail enthusiastically and licks the side of her face. He clearly doesn’t understand what the problem was, but he’s here to help her feel better anyway. Such is the unspoken moral code of all dogs. 

David, confused, shifts his weight from one foot to the other and puts his hand behind his head, obviously uncomfortable. “He needed to go out. You were busy, so I, you know, took him out and let him do his little thing.” The words are flustered, the cadence of a man who is ashamed to have been won over by a dog, but for once, Alexis lets the opportunity to mock him pass her by.

“I thought he was gone forever!” she coos as she scratches behind Spencer’s ears.

“You thought the dog went _outside on his own_ and _locked the door behind him?_ ” David asks, incredulous. “I don’t know how to break this to you, Alexis, but even if he did have thumbs, which he _obviously_ doesn’t, he isn’t tall enough to reach the knob.”

“Hey, David,” she says, still staring at the dog and ignoring her brother.

“What, Alexis?” David’s reply is accompanied by an all-too familiar, world-weary sigh.

“ _Shut up_.”

When it is safe for the vet’s office to reopen again, Alexis returns Spencer to the kennel at Ted’s request. Mrs. Price is still going to be out of town for another week, but Ted decided that they should probably return the pets to the office now that the damage is fixed. Alexis delays her arrival into work for as long as she can, just to share a little more time with the puppy while he’s still technically hers. She is going to miss the little guy. For a few days, he was her best friend.

And she thinks that he might have usurped her position as David’s best and only friend, too.

After all, she catches David sniffling as she starts to walk the puppy out the door. He wipes his nose on his sweater, turns his rapidly blinking eyes up towards the ceiling, and crosses his arms as he tried to pretend that he doesn’t care that the dog is leaving. Alexis, however, calls him on his bluff.

“You can go visit him anytime, if you want, you know. I bet Mrs. Price could use a good dog walker. She tells me that her hips aren’t what they used to be these days.”

David refuses to reply, but she can feel the thought and emotion radiating off him in waves.

“I’ll get you her address from the files at work. Ted won’t mind.”

Her brother breaks his stubborn silence to observe, “Alexis, that’s _illegal_.”

Alexis merely shrugs. “That’s never stopped me before.”

There is a cough and a restless shifting of feet. “I’ll check her voter registration and put a note in her mailbox.” His voice wavers ever so slightly, damp and hoarse with the tears that he has beenholding back.

Alexis smiles and playfully punches him in the shoulder. “Look at you! Solving problems all on your own!” she croons in the poor imitation of an adoring parent. Since she never had an adoring parent, she doesn’t _really_ know what one was supposed to sound like, and her impression lands much closer to ‘old woman who would probably tell you that staying the night in a haunted cabin in the middle of the woods is a bad idea.’

Despite her failure, it still manages to get under David’s skin.

“Alexis?” he says, leaning into her name as though he’s talking about a bit of freshly chewed bubblegum stuck to the underside of his designer shoes.

“Yes?”

“Shut up.”

And even though she has to take the dog home, even though their sad little motel rooms are going to be one resident short from now on, Alexis cannot help but grin.


End file.
